Lack of Home Office funding puts more pressure on local Council Tax payers

Yesterday I wrote to the Home Secretary regarding the announcement of Government funding for policing made just before Christmas.

The figures published to Parliament in December will leave Thames Valley Police £9m worse off than we expected when preparing the budget! Thos estimates were not based on optimism, but on the Government's own Comprehensive Spending Review carried out last summer.

The headline figures suggest that nationally there is around £100m less going in to policing than was announced back in June of last year. It appears that the majority of Force across the country lose out with most of the additional funding going to the Metropolitan Police in London.

This will impact on spending plans here in Thames Valley and mean that we draw down on our reserves more quickly than planned, putting the Force in a more uncertain financial position for years to come. I have rejected the option of seeking to heap even more pain on local council tax payers by going beyond the £15 council tax rise which has been assumed by the Home Office. The Government need to step up and honour the funding commitments they made just seven months ago.

Despite the financial challenges of recent years, we have continued to recruit more officers in Thames Valley. Reaching new heights with more police officers than the Force has ever seen. At the end of last year it became clear that some Forces around the country have failed to recruit enough officers and have underspent on their funding allocation from the Home Office. In December we applied for funding for a further 40, but have been allocated funding for just 4!